Thankfully, Devlin managed to appropriate a carriage quickly—a closed brougham
that doubtless belonged to one of Burke's guests. He shoved Jess and her father inside and climbed up in the driver's seat, taking the reins from an astonished groom. Just as he started to whip up the pair of bays, though, Ashton Burke came running toward them.
"I'm accompanying you!" Burke shouted, and grabbed for the door.
Devlin waited only long enough for Burke to climb inside before springing the horses.
Jess hung on tightly as the carriage lurched and swayed, while her lips move in a fervent litany, "Please, please, please . . ." Across from her, Burke sat in grim silence. Next to her, Riley leaned out the window, watching the rocky canyon wall streak past. It was highly dangerous, racing through the darkness along the narrow road in the wake of dozens of other vehicles, but Jess had faith that Devlin would get them through in one piece.
He slowed only when Silver Plume was in sight. From the carriage window, Jess could see the conflagration in the east end of town. It was roaring out of control through the densely packed wood-frame commercial district. Already the acrid smoke and heat were so intense she almost choked.
"What shall we do?" Jess asked her father anxiously, wondering if they should try to save any of their belongings from their home or boardinghouse.
"Better try to stop the fire first," Riley answered brusquely. "We won't have time to save much anyway if it gets as far as our place. And about the only thing that can't be replaced are the pictures of your ma. I won't let anything happen to those."
Burke, wincing at the reference to Jenny Ann, leaped down from the carriage. Riley and Jess followed with Devlin, heading toward the fire. When they reached Main Street, they could see that a line of men had formed to haul leather buckets from the creek, but dozens of others milled about helplessly. Taking charge, Burke began shouting orders and organizing the stragglers into another line.
Jess would have pitched in, but Devlin stopped her.
"You help with the women and children! Get them out of here and keep them calm."
Wishing she could do more, Jess nodded obediently and caught the hand of a sobbing boy, leading him to a safer place down the street.
She spent the next five desperate hours corralling children and wetting down blankets and doctoring burns, but mostly she prayed. Her prayers went unanswered. The flames blazed higher as the mountain winds swept through the valley, fanning the fires and negating the most determined efforts of Silver Plume's residents and even the well-trained volunteer firemen of Georgetown's fire department. Building alter building along Main Street went up in a whoosh of sparks. Burke's Diamond Dust Hotel and Saloon, which lay directly in the path of the flames, were two of the first to go.
Jess felt a pang of regret for all the beautiful furnishings that were incinerated, but as Riley had said, belongings could be replaced; people couldn't. Her real fear was for Flo and Clem and her boarders and the hundreds of other friends she had known all her life.
For the most part, though, the townspeople managed to flee to safety. Jess saw hundreds of dazed victims of the fire trudge past her, lugging valuables. Others packed the crowded thoroughfare, merely staring in shock as the Plume burned down around them. Once she spied Clem fighting the fire, his shouted curses reaching her even over the crackling roar of the flames. And just past midnight, Flo joined her. Calm and motherly, Flo provided Jess the inspiration to keep on and even managed to dredge a strangled laugh from her in the midst of the hellish nightmare.
A knot of women and children had gathered at the little
Catholic church to pray, but Flo scolded them into action, pointing to the church.
"Those walls may be made of stone, but that roof is pure tinder. And the Good Lord sure as shootin' would rather you get up off your knees and get to work at a time like this!"
As a group, the women began carrying water to throw on the church roof. Trouble was, the cisterns in back of the adjacent buildings held too little water to make any difference in a blaze like this. They gave it their best effort, though, Jess included. Too afraid to be tired, too tired to be afraid, she kept swinging buckets. Her throat and nostrils ached from the stinging smoke, while her palms blistered from the leather handles.
And all the while the dreaded flames kept crawling closer, engulfing everything in their path, driving the firefighters back.
Finally the heat and smoke became too intense to bear. The lines of men fell back, sweeping the women behind them.
Incredibly, though, just as the fire began licking at the stone wall of the little church, the wind miraculously shifted. Jess and everyone else held their breaths as the greedy flames curled back on themselves. Minute after minute they watched, but the devastation seemed to have faltered. The firefighters continued the battle with bucket and hoses, and actually appeared to be winning.
It was nearly dawn by the time they could declare victory, though—if such destruction could be called victory. Three blocks of the town had been razed, and most of the business district lay in smoldering ruins. All the saloons, dance halls, hotels, stores, shops, and offices—everything that had been the lifeblood of Silver Plume was gone.
A few lanterns appeared then to illuminate the terrible scene. Groups of weary, soot-covered men searched in the smoking debris for burning coals, extinguishing any remaining flames. The women made coffee and passed out mugs with forced smiles. Some of the townspeople simply sank to their knees where they stood, their stricken, defeated expressions showing more clearly than words what wreckage the fire had made of their lives.
Jess felt immeasurably lucky and somewhat guilty. Their house and boardinghouse had been spared, but many had lost their livelihood and hundreds of miners and their families were now homeless.
And at least one person had died. At dawn, the charred remains of a body was found among the ashes of the building that had been Patrick Barrett's saloon.
"Poor bastard," Jess heard somebody say. "Patty was too young to die . . . if that's him."
Jess shivered in the cold dawn air. Reminded forcefully of how fragile life was in this rugged country, she worriedly searched the crowds for Devlin and Riley. She found her father resting on the boardwalk with Clem, while Flo hovered over them. Both men were exhausted but unhurt, but there was no sign of Devlin.
Two minutes later, though, she spied his tall form moving through the throng. Picking up her now-ruined skirts, Jess ran to meet him, and with a glad cry flung her arms around his neck.
"Devlin—Garrett . . . I was so worried about you. . . ." Her breathless comment was muffled against his throat.